Author's Note: I want to apologize in advance if anything tech-related that I mentioned is wrong or doesn't make sense. I don't know shit about robots, other than what was mentioned on the show, and even then I barely understood.

DO NOT REVEAL ANDROID STATUS.

DO NOT LIE.

The young robot was at a complete loss as to what to do. Was she to lie, thus overriding her programming, or tell the truth, thus overriding her programming? Which command was to take precedence over the other when her creator maintained that both were of equal importance?

Alas, such was the dilemma that Frankie Gaines was faced with at the current moment; at her doorstep stood her friend/crush, Cole Reyes, anxiously awaiting her response to the question he had just posed to her.

Are you a robot?

Oh, why hadn't Mom included some kind of fail-safe within her files somewhere? No matter how many Frankie searched through, there was not a single one that mentioned anything about receiving conflicting instructions. Perhaps Mom didn't think that there would ever be a conceivable reason for her two most important commands to ever clash. After all, the only way for them to even become contradictory was for someone to specifically question whether she was an android or not. So essentially, Frankie had inadvertently created some kind of loop-hole by acting suspicious enough for someone to suspect that she was not human.

Frankie continued her fruitless search efforts for a few seconds longer before closing all of the windows she had open on her interface - she was absolutely, positively, one hundred percent screwed.

Well, it seemed as though it was up to her now to decide which command to prioritize. Now, logically it would be to not reveal her status, but as Frankie stared into the eyes of her crush, she knew she couldn't not tell him the truth. Besides, she wasn't the one that was revealing her status so to speak, as he seemed to have already figured that out. Frankie would only be not lying to him by nodding her head...right?

Damn, Mom was absolutely going to kill her if she happened to look through Frankie's memories later on tonight.

Slowly, the girl's head moved up and down.

"Yes, Cole Reyes." Her voice was shaky. "I am a robot."

He sucked in a breath, then covered his mouth with both hands and took two steps backwards.

Obviously, that was not the answer he was expecting.

Frankie did not know what to do; while his reaction was not unexpected, it wasn't one that she had experienced before. The only other person that knew that she was an android was Dayton Reyes, her best friend who happened to be Cole's sister, and while she was shocked to find out that her best friend was a robot, her reaction had not been nearly as bad as her brother's was.

Although, if Dayton was correct about her brother's feelings for Frankie, then it made sense for him to respond the way that he did, as he would have just discovered that the girl he'd been crushing on was in fact a robot.

But how did Cole even get the idea in his head? When she looked back to their prior interactions, nothing was out of the ordinary. They hung out and chatted at school with Dayton just as they normally did. So, what gives? What on earth had suddenly convinced him that the girl he liked was a robot?

As she quickly scanned her memory files, she came across one with a certain brunette surrounded by her two minions smirking at her as they passed Frankie in the hallway. This was just this afternoon, actually.

Of course.

This had to be that awful Tammy Gilroy's fault - the little snob had had it out for Frankie since the moment they met. That girl had to have been the one whispering in his ear about her, there was not a single doubt in the android's mind. Who else cared enough to want to ruin her and Cole's chance at a relationship? Aside from Mom, of course, who was quite apprehensive about her daughter growing closer to Cole, but there was no way Mom would compromise her identity just to scare him off.

Although, in the end, it hadn't really mattered how he got the idea. He simply asked if it was true, and Frankie could not bring herself to lie to him.

Frankie took a step closer to him, hoping that he wasn't going to back away from her again. She wanted to assure him that he needn't be afraid of her, and that he didn't have to see her any differently now as she was still the same girl he'd known since the start of the school year.

"...I am truly sorry that I could not be honest with you, Cole Reyes," she said softly, "You have no idea how badly I wanted you to know, but my mother would simply not allow it."

Finally, Cole turned his head back to her, the look of awe still present on his face.

"I can't believe this is actually happening right now." His head shook in disbelief. "You're - you're actually a robot? Like, seriously? This isn't some kind of sick prank you're playing on me?"

"I am afraid it is the truth." She reluctantly replied. "I am a robot."

"Holy shit," he whispered, his eyes widening even more. "Holy shit."

Still uncertain as to what she should do, Frankie took another step towards him. He hadn't moved away from her, so she took that as a good sign. He didn't appear to be scared of her at least, which was a relief.

"Please understand, Cole Reyes, that I never meant to deceive you-"

"Were you ever planning on telling me?" He cut her off, an unfamiliar coldness in his tone. "If I hadn't asked, were you ever going to be honest with me?" His eyes were no longer wide, but narrowed as he waited for her response.

She was about to nod (because of course she planned on telling the boy she liked she was a literal robot), when the warning flashed in front of her eyes again.

DO NOT LIE.

Realistically, the answer would have to be a resounding no - her programming would have never allowed her to be honest with him, no matter how much she wanted to.

He must have taken her silence as an answer, as he shook his head and let out a scoff. "Right, that's what I thought."

The android felt an uncomfortable knot forming in her e-stomach. Oh, he was definitely angry with her, and there was not a single thing she could do or say to make him feel better. But she had to try, otherwise she was afraid that she would lose him forever.

However, by the time she opened her mouth, the boy had already turned his back to her and left without sparing her another glance.

Frankie spent the entire rest of the evening up in her room, blatantly ignoring her mother's calls for her to come downstairs to join the rest of the family for dinner. The android did not want any company at the moment, especially not the company of her over-protective creator also known as Mom. After all, this entire situation with Cole was all her fault - it was all because of Mom that Frankie couldn't have any relationships that weren't built upon the foundation of a lie.

Seriously, what was the point of having friends if she had to withhold the truth from them every single moment of every single day? At this point, she may as well spend the rest of eternity back at the lab where she belonged. Mom's hypothesis had clearly failed; a humanoid robot could not assimilate seamlessly into human society.

Every time the girl closed her eyes, all she could see was the look on Cole's face as he struggled to grasp the meaning of the words that she had said.

Yes, Cole Reyes. I am a robot.

She sat there, in her charging port, holding her face in her hands as that moment replayed over and over in her head. Would he ever be able to forgive her for lying to him? She really hoped so, because a life without Cole Reyes in it was not something she even wanted to think about.

If Frankie had truly lost him forever, then she would rather be permanently shut down than continue to live with this hollow feeling in her chest cavity.

After an entire week of Cole freezing her out, Frankie was ready to just give up on the idea of ever being able to talk to him again. At this point, it was clear that he no longer had any interest in her now that he knew what she was - a collection of computer parts carefully fused together to create something that resembled a human, yet never quite would be.

As such, the only one she was fooling was herself if she stupidly believed that she could ever compare to what a human girl could offer him. After all, every single aspect of her very being was crafted within the four walls of a laboratory, meaning that no part of her was ever actually, truly, real.So it was no surprise that Cole would want to stay as far away from her as possible.

The past few days, instead of bothering her mother or father for a ride, Frankie had taken it upon herself to just go ahead and walk home from school. The peaceful alone time gave her a chance to think everything over, and wonder how, or if, she could ever get Cole Reyes to forgive her one day.

Once classes ended for the day, Frankie bid Dayton Reyes and Byron Patrick goodbye before heading outside to begin the journey home.

Today, it seemed, there was an eighty three percent chance of rain within the next ten minutes. By her calculations, she would have to travel at a speed of twenty miles per hour in order to get home before the water could do any irreversible damage. Although, one would think with how advanced the modern-day world was, there would have been some kind of breakthrough in waterproof technology by now. It'd certainly be helpful for days like this, when she didn't necessarily want to rush home right away.

The wind started to pick up speed, causing all of her synthetic hair to flow to the right side of her head. Unexpectedly, only three and a half minutes in to her walk, a warning was flashing across her eyes.

INADEQUATE SHELTER DETECTED
 FIND SHELTER IMMEDIATELY

Slightly panicked, when the android scanned the area around her, unfortunately there did not appear to be a single spot that could offer her complete protection. She was surrounded by dozens of houses, but it wasn't like she could go knocking on strangers' doors asking if she could come inside just until the weather cleared up. There were some trees covering parts of the sidewalk, but the gaps in between the leaves would leave her too exposed still.

That was when something began falling from the sky, hitting her head, her shoulders, and most critically, her charging port on the back of her neck. Her head started to twitch, as well as one of her eyes, signaling that it was only a matter of time before the rest of her began to malfunction.

Another warning appeared in large, blinking letters.

MOISTURE DETECTED
 START EMERGENCY GETAWAY

There was nowhere to go, no one to ask for help, and very little time for her to find cover before it was too late.

In her paralyzed state, Frankie had dozens of warnings repeatedly shining in big, bold letters, the kind of warnings that were supposed to be reserved for the most emergent of situations. Well, this was as much as an emergency as it got, the android supposed. Her battery power was dwindled rapidly, faster than she could process, until the dreaded low battery warning started to flash alongside the rest.

With fifteen percent of power remaining, she did her best to navigate through her glitched interface, desperate to send her mother, her father, her sister - anyone, a message to alert them of her impending doom.

"Frankie?"

Taking her focus off of her crashing internal system, Frankie looked straight down the path of the cement sidewalk to see the absolute last person she had been expecting to. At this point one of her lenses that took the shape of and purpose of a human eyeball had been badly damaged as a result of her internal processors starting to lose power. She thought she must have looked nearly unrecognizable now, but evidently not.

Despite the immense pain surging through her body, she was still able to smile at the sight of him. "Cole Reyes, hi."

"What's going on?" He wasted no time jogging the rest of the way towards her, a look of concern on his face. "Hey, are you okay?"

Without waiting for her to respond, he quickly shrugged off his jacket and wrapped it around her head and shoulders. Keeping his hands on her arms, he turned her slightly towards him. "What are you doing out here in the rain?"

"I was walking home."

"You didn't check the weather beforehand?" Cole raised his eyebrows, confused at the idea of a computer not performing such a logical task. "Didn't you know it was going to rain?"

Frankie did not respond, instead pushing his hands off of her and tossing the jacket back at him. "Thank you for your concern, Cole Reyes, but I am fine. I am not in need of your assistance. Now, if you will excuse me, I am going home."

The boy stood there, looking dumb-founded at the sudden shift in the android's attitude. He took a step forward, trying to get in front of her to prevent her from leaving. "Hold on a minute. You look horrible, I don't think you should go by yourself."

"You should not concern yourself with whatever happens to me." Frankie told him matter-of-factly, staring straight into his eyes with her good one. "You have made your feelings about me perfectly clear."

Cole was sounding more confused by the minute as he responded softly, "What are you talking about? Of course I care what happens to you."

"Well, you have a very strange way of showing it. I did not realize that ignoring me for seven days straight was your way of caring." She could not help the irritation seeping its way into her tone. Because, yes, as much of a right he had to be angry, he did not have to be so cruel as to shut her out without warning. Robot or not, Frankie was a person with feelings. She was not the empty, mindless machine that he had thought she was.

When all she received in reply was a look of concern, she looked away and proceeded to walk past him, but then he said the two words she had been waiting a week to hear.

"I'm sorry."

He waited until she turned back around to continue. Still not taking his eyes off of her, he closed the distance between them by coming to stand right in front of her. "I'm so sorry for the way that I acted. I was a jerk."

Frankie nodded her head in agreement. "You were, but I forgive you."

"Yeah. So, uh, I just wanted you to know..." He cleared his throat and rubbed the back of his neck, a slight blush washing over his cheeks as he said his next words aloud.

"I really like you, Frankie. And it doesn't matter to me if you're a robot, or an alien, or a human. I like you for you, not because of what you are."

For a few short moments, she was speechless. Dayton had actually been right all along about her brother's feelings for her. Cole liked her. Helikedher, in the exact same way that she liked him.

The brightest smile appeared on her face when she spoke again. "I really like you too, Cole Reyes."

Without another word, he placed a hand on her cheek and pressed his lips against hers, all the while wearing a smile himself.

Once they pulled away, Frankie felt a sudden pressure in her chest, before an unfamiliar, rhythmic movement began.

A heart.

"Now, let's get you home before your battery dies."